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Paul Gerhardt

Birth: March 12, 1607, Grafenhainichen (near Wittenberg), Germany

Death: May 27, 1676, Lubben an der Spree, Spreewalk, Germany

Paul Gerhardt, born in 1607, was the son of the Burgermeister of
Grafenhaynichen, a small town in Saxony, near Wittenberg. He graduated from the
University of Wittenberg and took a position as tutor in the home of Berlin's Chancellor-Advocate, Andreas Barthold. He began writing hymns in his leisure time. He later married the Barthold's daughter, Anna.

In 1651 Gerhard became paster at Mittenwalde, near Berlin. After serving
there for 6 years, he was called to the third Diaconate of St. Nicholas, Berlin.
Here crowds came to hear him preach and to sing with enthusiasm the hymns that
he wrote. However, in 1667 he was forced to leave because he would not limit his
preaching on controversial subjects. In 1668, though, he was offered the post of
archidiaconus at Lubben an der Spree, where he remained until his death.

Gerhardt, was, next to Martin Luther, the most popular hymnist of Germany.
His hymns were published in the "Berlin Hymn-Book" (1653) and other collections
in Brandenburg and Saxony. J. E. Eberling published the first complete edition of his 123 hymns in 1666-1667. Wackernagel says "Where is the Evangelical congregation that does not know Paul Gerhardt? In what churches are not his holy songs heard? What the pious Catherine Zell, of Strasburg, says of beautiful spiritual songs in her hymn-book is true of him: "The journeyman mechanic at his work, the servant-maid washing her dishes, the ploughman and vine-dresser in the
fields, the mother by her weeping infant in the cradle, sing them." Many of his
hymns were published in Johann Cruger's "Praxis Pietatis Melica." (1656).